Match three crops in a row to harvest them. Plan ahead to make big combos. Move quickly
before the Skull eats the crops, and collect enough crops to meet the needs of your
people. Or, play Night Practice mode for a quick one-level game you can play at your own pace,
without the Skull.

Game design

Milpa combines match-three gameplay with an arrangement concept from the text-based game
Reverse
published in the 1978 book BASIC Computer Games. Put together, it creates a
one-dimensional match-three game.

About the Author

Further reading on Native Americans

Continuing with the Mesoamerican theme, Milpa's game over screen makes random
references to several indigenous cultures from the western hemisphere, including groups that
still exist day.
For example, on one game over screen, the game references the Shoshone, a
group mostly located in what is now the western U.S. and was known for digging up
roots and tubers for food. (I read about them
in one of my favorite books, Man's Rise to Civilization.)

If you're interested in this sort of thing, here are my favorite books about Native Americans
and other indigenous peoples around the world.
(Yes, the links shamelessly include my Amazon affiliate tag.)